


I can move, I can run

by Merideath



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Anxiety, F/M, Fluff and Humor, Holding Hands
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-05-03
Updated: 2017-05-03
Packaged: 2018-10-27 15:49:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 940
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10812084
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Merideath/pseuds/Merideath
Summary: "Promise you’ll hold my hand?”





	I can move, I can run

**Author's Note:**

> It's been a long time since I posted anything, since I wrote much more than a few lines all at once. This year has been kicking my ass but I'm still writing and creating so it must count for something, right? This bunny has been in my head awhile, and I hope that I can get it together enough to work on it a little more. I have two more scenes outlined in my head so with a little love and a lot of focus I will get it written, along with working on the half-dozen or so wips in gdocs.
> 
> Depression and anxiety tend to kill my ability to focus enough to string words together to form a story. And though I try to write and do more I rarely have enough spoons to write more than a few sentences in any one sitting. I'm not very good at being patient with myself but I'm trying. 
> 
> Thank you for taking the time to read this story, and any of my previous ones. I may not have the spoons to reply to comments but they do mean a great deal to me. Especially on the days when I forget how to be nice to myself. 
> 
> Oh, and I have a ficlet I posted on tumblr the other week that I forgot to crosspost, so there will be something else popping up soon. 
> 
> Thanks go to dizzyredhead and Aenaria for beta'ing this story for me.

There’s a stone in her throat. Anxiety, hard and sharp. “Promise you’ll hold my hand?” 

“It's perfectly safe.”

“Jaaaane,” Darcy says, not caring if she sounds like a whiny brat. She isn’t normally this much of a chickenshit, but the thought of interplanetary travel, galaxy hopping, or skipping the rainbow bridge is terrifying. It’s definitely not something Darcy ever imagined she would do. The excitement of it all has bubbled away days ago. 

Darcy dips her hand into her satchel again. The bag is stuffed to bursting point, the strap digging into her shoulder, a pressing between her breasts that makes them feel lopsided. The pads of her fingers catch on the edge of a book, the hard case of the backup charger for her phone, the crinkling wrapper of a candy bar, and the box of emergency coffee sachets. 

“I told you, you won’t need any of that where we’re going,” Jane says. Darcy rolls her eyes and taps the side of Jane’s holdall with the tip of her boot. “That’s different. I need my equipment.”

“You’re getting married, Jane-y, pretty sure the only equipment-”

“Don’t,” Jane huffs out a laugh, spots of color burning hot on her cheeks. 

“Speaking of hammer holding, where is your beloved?”

“Collecting a guest.”

“Dad changed his mind?”

“No, not Erik. I don’t blame him for not wanting to go anywhere near Loki.” Jane says. She reaches into her coat, checking the readout of a small screen on what might have been a Nokia 3310 once upon a time before Jane dug it out of a kitchen drawer at her mother’s house.

A crack of thunder sounds overhead. Neither woman blinks, though both tilt their heads up to watch as Thor lands neatly beside them with a duffle bag in his free hand. He drops the bag onto the tarmac and sweeps Jane up into his arms, his whole face lighting up in a big goofy smile that matches Jane’s. 

Darcy smiles to herself, looking away at the distant buildings. If she runs now they would never notice she was gone, but if she did run then she would never get to see Jane’s Big Fat Asgardian Wedding. The rumble of a motorcycle disrupts the chain of anxiety-riddled thoughts in her head. The bike rolls into the lot and the engine cuts out. “Steve,” Darcy chokes out. She raises a hand in an awkward wave. 

She doesn’t have a crush on him, not exactly. At least, not any more than a large portion of the world--and probably Asgard soon enough. But the possibility was there, in the crinkle of his eyes when his smile brightens, and the way he drags his fingers through his hair and short-cropped beard. 

Steve lifts a small duffle from the back of the bike and strides over to them. He's wearing a brown leather jacket over a red henley with small pearl buttons cling on for dear life. Long legs wrapped in dark jeans above brown leather boots. Darcy’s mouth goes dry, not desert dry, but enough to make her clear her throat and drop her gaze. 

“Captain,” Thor says, grasping Steve’s forearm and pulling him into a hug tight enough to squeeze the air from even Steve’s lungs. 

“Hey, Thor,” Steve gasps out, patting Thor feebly on the back. Or as feebly as an All-American Icon of Righteousness can be. “Dr Foster, Darcy.”

Darcy snorts and pretends not to notice. pushes her glasses up the slope of her nose.

“Are you ready for an adventure, my friends?” Thor booms. He loops an arm around Jane and pulls her tight into his chest. 

“Not really,” Darcy says under her breath. 

“Heimdall,” Thor shouts at the sky. 

“...let down your golden hair,” Darcy snarks softly. It almost makes her feel better. 

Steve coughs into his hand, the corners of his mouth twitching. 

The wind picks up and something like static electricity ripples over the quartet. Darcy’s eyes slam shut and she reaches blindly for Jane’s hand or the edge of Thor’s cape. 

The hand she grasps is large and warm. Jane’s hands are always cold. Always. Darcy cracks open an eyelid to see her hand in Steve’s. She squeezes her fingers tight and Steve squeezes back. 

“Don’t let go.”

“Not till you say.”

The world goes dark. Threads of light scratch across the expanse of black. Faint colours pulse at the edge of Darcy’s vision. Will-o-wisps of light that vanish with the turning of her head.The stone in her throat drops down to her toes and back up to lodge beneath her ribs. Light and darkness press down, and down. It feels like they aren't moving at all. They are moving way too fast. 

Darcy’s stomach lurches, but holds tight by the weight of anxiety. Steve’s hand is warm and real, an anchor in an intergalactic elevator. The world beneath her boots suddenly wasn’t the world she knew. A headache pulses at her temples and her knees threaten to buckle. Mario could totally keep his Rainbow Road. 

“You can open your eyes now,” says a low voice, stirring the hair above her ear. 

“They weren’t shut,” she says, prising open one eye and glaring up at Steve.

They’re standing in the inside of a Faberge egg. All gold and shiny and, well, really just super shiny. It’s breathtaking, all the glitter and Heimdall shining just as brightly in his armour. Why was everyone so damn tall all the time? It was enough to give her a complex, or would be if Jane wasn’t nearly the same height as Darcy was. “Woah.”

“And then some.”

“Welcome to Asgard.”

**Author's Note:**

> Title from 'Man on the Silver Mountain' by Rainbow.


End file.
